Mission Valley Shooting Club hosts monthly youth shoot for area kids

RONAN — It started out innocently enough three years ago, and has since grown to a full-fledged youth event at the Mission Valley Shooting Club in Ronan.

“I took my granddaughter and a couple of her friends to the range to shoot,” Mission Valley Shooting Club event coordinator Tom Fieber said. “They had fun and the next time her friends invited their friends down.”

Fieber started hosting the youth shoots about three or four times during the summer and fall, but demand for them got so big that they now have them on a monthly basis.

Known as the .22 Youth Shoot, area youth and parents, along with some visiting from as far away as Couer d’Alene and Spokane, come out to partake in the event.

“We’ve run about 60 different kids through the program,” Fieber said.

At the last shoot at the beginning of August, Fieber estimated that there were about 50 people at the Mission Valley Shooting Club range. The club just received a state grant to construct a range house for their .22 rimfire range to go along with their 100-200-300 yard range, their pistol range, their 100-yard indoor range and an archery range.

“I get a lot of phone calls,” Fieber said. “Quite a few of the new kids will come with another family.”

Fieber said that the youth shoot has gotten so popular that the state of Montana wants to shoot a video about it so they can show other areas how to hold such an event.

“That would be nice to see,” he said.

In the future, Fieber said he would like to see the youth shoot become more of a common thing in the area.

“I’d like to get started talking to the other ranges to start up these youth programs so it’s more of a statewide thing,” he said.

The event starts with a barbeque at noon, then the youth sign up for the shoot and receive a safety meeting on handling the firearms. They’re also provided with the proper eye protection.

“The parents accompany the kids at each one of their shooting stations. The NRA says that anybody under the age of 18 needs to be accompanied by a guardian,” Fieber said. “The parents are standing right there and it’s kind of a family thing. They’re responsible to do the scoring of the shooting, too.”

All the .22 rifles fired are Fieber’s own. Since it is competitive shooting, he said that the kids should get used to shooting the same standard rifles with the same standard ammo. The kids do shoot several rifles with different actions during the event, ranging from pump lever to bolt action to lever action.

“A lot of kids never get that kind of experience,” Fieber said.

“It’s open from ages 8 to 18, and a lot of kids have never shot rifles before,” Fieber said.

Right now, the youth shoot is an exclusive event in Lake County and if anyone has a budding sharpshooter, they’re more than welcome to come out to the Mission Valley Shooting Club.

For more information about the youth shoots, contact Fieber at 250-3386.